


Kiss It Better

by Trash_PandaTO



Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort, One Shot, reckless Nicole
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-30
Updated: 2018-03-30
Packaged: 2019-04-14 19:24:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14142885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trash_PandaTO/pseuds/Trash_PandaTO
Summary: Nicole is a little more reckless than usual, and everyone knows why. Everyone except Waverly.Shout-out to Orange17 for conspiring on this little story idea via the comments on Ride On. And if you haven’t done so yet, you should go read their amazingWayhaught Choose Your Own StoryGo do it. Seriously.





	Kiss It Better

It all started out with a random bar brawl at Shorty’s. 

Nicole wasn’t even on duty that night; she was just hanging out at the bar, waiting for Waverly to finish her shift. She was enjoying her beer when she heard some commotion over by the pool table. She didn’t know what was going on, and she really, really didn’t want to get involved on her one night off. But, uniform or not, she was an Officer of the Law, so when she heard the shouting and saw someone shoving Doc back by the chest, she walked over to try and talk some sense into the guys. Before she had even said a word to announce her presence, the argument had evolved into a fist fight, and two seconds later, Nicole felt an elbow connect with her eye.

Things were a little blurry after that. She remembered hearing Gus yell at everyone to “cut it out”, and she thought she heard Waverly threaten the guys with her shotgun. 

Then she felt someone tug her away from the action and sit her down in a booth. She couldn’t see out of her left eye, and she could feel blood trickling down the side of her face. A moment later, Waverly appeared with some ice wrapped in a clean towel.

“Here, baby. Put this on, to keep the swelling down. I’ll grab my coat and take you to the ER. That’s gonna need stitches.”

She pressed the ice against her face and winced. She saw Doc walking over, looking sheepish.

“I am truly sorry, Miss Nicole. I was not aware of your presence when I took that swing. It was not my intention…”

He trailed off when Nicole waved her hand at him.

“It’s okay. Shit happens. Don’t worry about it.”

Waverly returned and drove her to the ER as promised. A couple of hours and four stitches later, they were on their way back to the Homestead. When they arrived, Waverly pulled Nicole into her bedroom, carefully sitting her down on the bed. Nicole watched out of her good eye as Waverly started to undo her boots. 

“I’m sorry, Wave. This isn’t how I envisioned my night off with you to go.”

“Baby, it’s okay. That wasn’t your fault.” Waverly lifted herself up to sit next to Nicole and leaned over to place a very gentle kiss near Nicole’s temple. “I’m just going to spend the night kissing it better, okay?”

“Oh. Well, if that’s the case, I should let you know that I also hurt my lip a little bit, and my chest…”

“Is that so?”

Nicole grinned as she felt Waverly’s lips on her face, her neck, and moving lower still.

***

A few days after that night, Nicole was out on a call with Lonnie. They had been tracking some teenagers who they thought were pulling up fence posts all over town, likely just for fun. They were driving along one of the dirt roads bordering the Winter’s ranch land when they spotted a group of four guys kicking down part of the fence right in front of them. They stopped the cruiser and got out, anticipating a simple conversation, but as soon as the teens saw the two cops, they took off running into the field. Lonnie moved back toward to cruiser to radio for back-up, but Nicole was already sprinting toward the field and chasing the group.

“Haught! What are you doing?”

“Drive around the north end, Lonnie. You can cut them off there if I can get them to run that way.” 

Nicole continued her chase. As she had predicted, they were running toward the north side of the field, where they would be able to disappear into a patch of trees. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the cruiser speeding along the road, kicking up a cloud of dust in its wake. As the teenagers reached the end of the field, Lonnie had almost caught up to them, but Nicole knew she would need to chase them to her right a bit so they wouldn’t have a chance to get away. The only problem with that was the barbed wire fence that was still very much intact on this side of the field. Nicole saw it, sized it up and decided to jump. Running at full speed, she figured it wouldn’t be much different than jumping hurdles like she had done in her college track and field competitions.

It didn’t quite work out as planned. As she jumped, her front foot slipped in some mud and she lost most of her momentum. The next thing she felt was a painful sting across her leg, followed by a ripping noise. She lost her balance and ended up face first in the mud. By the time she looked up, she saw Lonnie grabbing two of the teenagers by their arms while yelling at the others to stay put. He shoved them all into the back of the cruiser before he walked over to check on his partner.

“Haught, you okay?”

Nicole’s leg was tangled in barbed wire and still stuck in the fence. She groaned.

“Just…help me up, would you?”

They untangled her leg, but both of them saw the rather nasty cuts the wire had left near Nicole’s knee.

“Shit, Haught. That looks bad. I’m gonna have to take you to the ER to get that looked at. And most definitely to get your tetanus shots updated.”

Later, at the hospital, the nurse was just finishing up cleaning the cuts when Waverly burst into the room.

“Baby! Are you okay? I ran into Lonnie at the station and he said he dropped you off here. Something about a fence?”

“I’m fine, Waverly. Just some cuts. They just wanted to make sure nothing gets infected.”

Waverly shook her head slightly, worry still clear on her face. She put her hands on her hips and tipped her head to the side just a bit, trying for her best stern expression.

“I don’t know what I’m gonna do with you, Nicole Haught.”

“You could…um…kiss it better?”

At that, the nurse looked up at Nicole, eyes wide and her forehead wrinkled. She finished taping some gauze to her leg and quickly excused herself.

“Kiss it better, huh? I think that can be arranged. Come on, baby, let’s take you home.”

*** 

Later that same week, Nicole was called out to Gertrude Hope’s house. The older woman had called to report an intruder in her house, but when Nicole showed up, it didn’t take her long to figure out that the intruder was, in fact, a feral cat that had made her way into the house and was now attacking everyone who went near the downstairs bathroom where it had taken shelter.

Nicole radioed into the station to let them know what was going on.

“Alright, Haught, I’ll call Animal Control. You can tell Gertrude that they’ll probably be out there this afternoon to get rid of the cat.”

“No need, Ruthie. It’s a cat. I can trap it with a blanket or cardboard box or something and get it out.”

“Haught. That’s not how we do things. You know the protocol for this.”

“I know, I know, Ruthie. But Mrs Hope is actually terrified, and I really don’t want to just leave her here with this cat until Animal Control can get out here.”

Ruthie sighed. She knew how dramatic Gertrude Hope could be when she wanted to get something done right away.

“Alright, Haught, give it a shot but call me back if you need me to get the York boys out there after all.”

“Will do, Ruthie.”

About 20 minutes later, Ruthie heard back from Nicole. According to the Officer, the cat had been escorted out of the house and far enough away from the property that it wouldn’t be tempted to come back anytime soon.

When Nicole got back to the station, Waverly was just walking out of the BBD office and almost bumped into her girlfriend.

“Hey baby.” Waverly smiled, but immediately noticed something was off when she saw that Nicole had done up both her jacket and shirt all the way. “What’s going on? You never do up those top buttons.”

Nicole grimaced and opened her shirt collar, showing off several deep claw marks. Waverly gasped.

“What…what happened?”

“A cat.”

“CJ did that? Did you try and rub her belly or something?”

Nicole laughed at that. “No, baby, not CJ. And I know better than to touch her belly. That’s a trap! No, there was a feral cat in Mrs. Hope’s house. I got it out, but it left some marks in the process.”

“No kidding. Those are some pretty deep scratches. You guys have a first aid kit here? I can help you disinfect those and cover them up properly.”

With that, Waverly pulled Nicole into the BBD office and and onto a chair. She found the first aid material and gently cleaned Nicole’s neck, kissing the skin close to the area every now and then. She found some large bandaids and taped them over the scratches.

“There. It looks a little bit like a teenager trying to cover up a hickey, so you might get some flak from Wynonna for that.”

Nicole huffed, but didn’t respond immediately.

“Just tell her it’s not a hickey yet, but that I’ll be working on one later tonight.”

In response, Nicole’s entire face turned a deep shade of red, but she couldn’t stop the dopey smile that stayed put for the rest of the afternoon.

***

A couple of weeks later, Nicole found herself staring down a revenant who had an affinity for flamethrowers. She had been helping Wynonna track down the guy and they had finally managed to sort of corner him by the old junk yard. Nicole and Wynonna had split up, and when Nicole rounded a corner and stepped into the space between an old shed and a pile of scrap metal, she walked right between the revenant and Wynonna.

“Excellent. I get two for the price of one today.” The revenant growled, pointing the flamethrower at Nicole, Wynonna only two steps behind her.

“Wynonna, now would be a good time for your ‘Make your Peace’ thing.” Nicole hissed.

“Well yeah. It would. Except I dropped Peacemaker over there somewhere.”

Nicole’s eyebrows shot up into her hairline. “You what?”

“I almost had him, back there. And then I tripped over some… junk….because, well, we’re in a fucking junk yard.”

“Wynonna!”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, Haught. Junk isn’t your thing. I get it.”

“Wynonna…”

“Stop arguing! Stupid bitches. You’re both gonna die here, so just shut up.”

The revenant lifted the flamethrower and aimed it at both women. In the blink of an eye, Nicole made her decision. Just as the first burst of fire was shooting towards them, she turned and threw herself on Wynonna, knocking them both backwards. Then, she rolled on her back and fired a few shots toward the revenant, hoping she could buy Wynonna enough time to run and get Peacemaker. She heard Wynonna scrambling away and continued emptying her clip, aiming somewhere toward the flames that were now licking at her hands and arms.

The next thing she was aware of was Wynonna yelling at the revenant to get his attention, a loud shot and the revenant getting sucked into the ground. Then she heard Wynonna rushing to where she was still half sitting, half lying on the ground.

“Nicole! Shit.”

Wynonna helped Nicole get up, carefully avoiding her arms that had taken the brunt of the flames. They got back to the cruiser and Wynonna drove Nicole to the ER. When they reached the hospital, the triage nurse took one look at Nicole and raised an eyebrow.

“You know, Officer, this isn’t like getting frequent flyer miles or rebate points. I’ve seen your face way too often over the past month.”

Wynonna stayed with Nicole as the doctor and nurse treated the burns on her arms. She was about to drive Nicole back to the Homestead when Waverly came running through the main doors of the ER.

“Oh my god! What happened?”

“Well, your girlfriend here decided to play hero and ended up extra Haught and crispy as a result.”

“Wynonna!”

“Too soon?”

“Yes! Very much too soon! Come on, Nicole. I’ll take you home and take care of you.”

Nicole smiled and ignored the gagging noises coming from Wynonna in that moment.

Later that night, Nicole walked downstairs into the kitchen to get a drink of water. She found Wynonna sitting at the table with a bottle of whiskey in front of her, staring at nothing. Nicole frowned.

“You okay?”

“Hm? Oh. Yeah, I’m fine. I just…I’m sorry you got hurt today, Nicole. What you did was…pretty stupid, actually, but thanks.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Well, I do. Worry. I know Waverly would never forgive me if something serious happened to you. Not that second degree burns on both arms isn’t serious. But…you know what I mean.”

Nicole sighed.

“I do.”

“Okay, then…stop playing the hero. I know what you did today was, well, you were trying to protect me, us, and I appreciate that. A lot. But we could have figured out something else. Another solution that wouldn’t have involved you throwing yourself into the line of fire. Literal fire, Nicole!”

Nicole was looking at her feet. She felt bad about making Wynonna worry. She felt even worse about making Waverly worry.

“Okay.”

“Okay. Good talk. And now go back upstairs before Waverly comes looking for you. I’m sure she’s not done with you yet. I’m gonna go stay with Dolls tonight so I don’t have to hear you guys all night long.”

***

Nicole did her best to stay away from physical harm after that. It helped that Nedley had assigned her to desk duty after giving her a stern talking to about being more careful and needing to follow protocol more closely. 

Outside of work, the whole gang did their best to keep Nicole away from situations that could be physically dangerous. When Nicole mentioned that she had to replace her outside lights at her house, Dolls volunteered to do it for her so she wouldn’t have to step on a ladder. Similarly, Doc offered to help her put in a new cat door, even though he had never worked with power tools before. He spent the entire afternoon calling the mitre saw a tool of the devil, but managed to install the door without letting Nicole get anywhere near the action. At the station, Jeremy had set up his own work in the break room. He jumped up every time Nicole came in for a refill of her coffee, grabbed her mug from her and filled it before carefully handing it back to her. After the first two times, Nicole frowned, but Jeremy just shrugged.

“Did you know that most accidents happen in the home or office? Hot liquids are a common culprit.”

Nicole huffed and walked back to her desk. 

A couple of weeks later, they were all sitting at Shorty’s, celebrating after Wynonna sent another revenant back to hell. The whole gang was there, and even Nedley made an appearance. After a toast and several shots of whiskey, Wynonna bumped Nicole’s shoulder.

“So, Haught, how’s it going now that you no longer have constant excuses to ask Waverly to ‘kiss it better’?”

Nicole choked on her beer and Waverly smacked her sister’s arm.

“What? We all knew what was going on here.” Wynonna said, gesturing between the two women. “You kept getting hurt, and you…kept rewarding her with…”

“Wynonna!” Both Nicole and Waverly tried to get her to shut up, nodding toward Nedley. 

Nedley laughed but definitely looked a little uncomfortable. “Now, I might be an old man, but I’m not stupid. As much as it pains me to say this, but Wynonna’s right. We all knew what was going on between you two.”

Waverly’s face scrunched up in confusion. “What are you saying?”

“Babygirl, I thought you were the smart one here.”

Doc piped in. “We’re saying that Officer Haught may have been a little unusually reckless for a while because she knew you would take such good care of her afterwards.”

“Nicole?”

Nicole was looking at her lap, fiddling with the hem of her shirt.

“Baby, are you saying you kept getting hurt on purpose?”

“What? No. Not…not on purpose. I just…” She trailed off.

“You just what?”

“I just may not have been quite as careful as I normally am?”

Wynonna smacked the table. “Reckless. That’s what that’s called.”

Waverly glared at her sister. “Shut it, Wynonna. You’re the last person that should be giving anyone a lecture about being reckless. Also, if I’m not mistaken, Nicole saved your ass the other day at the junk yard.”

Wynonna huffed but didn’t respond. 

“And you” Waverly was now facing Nicole, eyes fixed on her girlfriend’s face, “Why did you do that? That’s…that’s stupid. You can’t walk around putting yourself in danger like that. Life in Purgatory is dangerous enough as it is. I already worry about you every time you leave the house. I can’t….I can’t lose you, Nicole.”

Nicole saw that there were tears clinging to Waverly’s lashes and she felt her stomach drop. “Baby. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I swear I didn’t do it on purpose. And I promise that I’ll be more careful from now on.”

“Much, much more careful.” Waverly insisted.

“The carefullest. I promise.”

Waverly looked at Nicole for a little while longer and then got up and grabbed her hand to pull her up and out of the booth they were sitting in.

“Where are you going?” Wynonna asked, surprised by the sudden motion.

“Home. I’m going to take my girlfriend home and make her promise me to be more careful. All night long. So you better find a place to spend the night, or buy some earplugs.”

“Urgh. Gross.”

Waverly just shrugged and continued to pull Nicole out of the bar. She briefly turned her head towards her girlfriend and said “You have some making up to do. A lot of making up, actually.”

“I'm on it, baby.”


End file.
